1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technology for connecting a memory to an information processor or to a gateway card.
2) Description of the Related Art
Recently, not only personal computers, but also home appliances such as the televisions and telephones, have been equipped with the Internet connection function. Such Internet function makes it possible to connect these home appliances to the Internet.
When a user purchases such an home appliances, it is required to do settings so that the home appliances can be connected to an access point of the Internet. These settings generally take lot of time and are tedious. Moreover, it is necessary to connect these home appliances to telephone lines, to computers etc. These connections are generally complex and troublesome.
A gateway device, called home gateway, has attracted attention in recent years. What this device does is that it adjusts the differences in the communication protocols between the network at home and external networks including the Internet.
Precisely, all the home appliances that have the Internet connection function are connected to this gateway device and the gateway device is connected to the public telephone line or other network: All the home appliances connected to the gateway device can be connected to the Internet so that tedious settings or complex wiring is not required.
A remote control system that remote controls home appliances such as a video recorder via the Internet and the gateway apparatus, has been proposed. Such remote control systems have been disclosed in the Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Nos. 2002-78036, 2001-95067, 2002-77274, and 2001-53779.
In installing a gateway device at home, conventionally there is a large constraint in the installation space. Electric charges, capacity, and power consumption of the gateway devices are taken into consideration before their installation. For example, when such gateway devices are to be used in the offices, reliability of the gateway device is given priority over its power consumption. However, when such gateway devices are to be used at homes, the power consumption is given priority over the reliability.